Doing Battle
In the spirit of being a fighting pistol, I loaded the Haka! with full power Winchester 240-gr. .44 Magnum loads right off the bat. I also admit I might not have entirely thought things through at that point. I have a 10" heavy steel plate hanging on chains about 20 yards downrange from my back porch. The first round not only smacked my hand hard enough to smart but at least sent the plate dancing too.
Since I still had feeling in my hand, I sent four more rounds in about as many seconds downrange, leaving the plate swinging — and me flicking my hand at my side while doing the “this hurts” dance. That’s similar to the spider web dance, but keeping the muzzle safe at the same time and saying things like “Ouch” and “Oh goodness, that hurt” and “My, my, I’ll think hard before doing this again” is part of the drill.
Or at least words to that effect.
Donning a shooting glove I shot a bit more of the heavy stuff — I know, I know, sometimes it takes me a long time to learn — but honestly did finally realize enough was enough. Can the Model 69 shoot full power .44 Magnum loads? Certainly, and in a pinch, a hard cast 240 at 1,100-1,200 fps is possible, and would likely save your skin. And I predict you wouldn’t hear a thing or feel a single bit of recoil.
But in the real world, would I shoot the stuff in this gun for fun? Again?
Nope.
You ever hit a steel post with an aluminum baseball bat with no gloves on? It’s sorta’ like that. Don’t ask me how I know. I can’t imagine this without the Mag-na-porting too, by the way. Call me sissified, but also call me still able to use both of my hands without spilling my coffee from the shakes.
In a more sane world, I shot a “mild” but highly effective .44 Magnum load from Black Hills, their HoneyBadger. It’s a 160-gr. solid copper fluted bullet chronographing at an honest 1,425 from the 2.75" barrel. As fire and brimstone as this sounds, recoil is manageable since it’s a lighter 160-gr. bullet. I think it’d stop just about anything walking on the planet.
Their sort of matching .44 Special HoneyBadger — a 125 with the same bullet design — flew at 1,135 fps from the short barrel. It was exceptionally fun to shoot, not to mention very accurate. I’ve seen the gel work on it and it penetrates deeply and reliably. For me, I think I found my main load for the Haka!
I ran some other .44 Special loads and found just about anything in the 240-gr. range at less than 850 fps to be okay, if not always entirely enjoyable to shoot. The classic 246-gr. lead round-nose .44 Special load chrono’d around the 625 fps range. I could actually see the bullet go and was tempted to race it to the target. But it was great fun to shoot, I’ll admit.
Accuracy was typical S&W style, and characteristically big-bore excellent. Say, 1.75" (Black Hills HoneyBadger .44 Special and about the same for their cowboy load at not quite 700 fps) to about 3.5" for the uglier .44 Magnum loads — mostly due to me gritting my teeth and likely shutting my eyes just before the big noise.
My 100-yard steel torso target got tired of being wanged. Bang, clang, bang, clang more often than not was the drill. Easy-peasy comes to mind when using the .44 Special loads. A fun thing is you can often watch the big bullets sort of lope in before hitting the steel at this distance. I kept laughing out loud at that. Who needs a flat-shooting magnum anyhow?
